Martin Luther King Jr.

“Our action now is not aimed at putting the bus company out of business, but only at putting justice in business.”

“We never assemble with a feeling of a sense of bitterness. We always assemble with deep tones of love in our hearts.”

“Maybe it takes something like this for the federal government to see that Alabama is not going to place any limit upon itself. It must be imposed from without.”

“The greatest need of civilization today is not political security; the greatest need of civilization today is not a well rounded United Nations Organization; the greatest need of civilization today is moral progress.”

“Help us to work with renewed vigor for a warless world, a better distribution of wealth, and a brotherhood that transcends race or color.”

“We must be willing to suffer and sacrifice to achieve our freedom. Our freedom will never be handed out on a silver platter.”

“Freedom is not free. It is always purchased with the high price of sacrifice and suffering.”

“The cause of justice and freedom has been betrayed by both political parties.”

“States should have rights, but no state should have the right to do wrong.”

“We have come a long, long way but we have a long, long way to go.”

“Segregation is a tragic cancer which must be removed before our democratic health can be realized.”

“It can be used either constructively or destructively, and it may well be that we will have to repent in this generation not merely for the bitter words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.”

“But if moderation means slowing up in the move toward justice and capitulating to the undemocratic practices of the guardians of a deadening status quo, then moderation is a tragic vice which men of good will must condemn.”

“We are all moving down the same road toward the same beautiful city of freedom and first-class citizenship.”

“Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope.”

“We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.”

“Make a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the noble struggle for equal rights. You will make a better person of yourself, a greater nation of your country, and a finer world to live in.”

“I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America. I speak out against it not in anger but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart, and above all with a passionate desire to see our beloved country stand as a moral example of the world.”

“If we are to have peace on earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a world perspective.”

“I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality, and freedom for their spirits.”

“It is not enough to say 'We must not wage war.' It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but the positive affirmation of peace.”

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”

“Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies.”

“We must come to see that the end we seek is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience.”

“True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.”